IN the history of the British
armed forces, two mutinies took place. One was the famous
naval mutiny, well known as the Mutiny on the Bounty, and
the second but lesser known was the mutiny by an Irish
regiment in India shortly after World War I in the summer
of 1920. This mutiny, which lasted for a month, had its
roots in the political struggle of the Irish people.

The rebellion or mutiny
by the famous Connaught Rangers, running parallel to the
Irish freedom movement under De Valera, was considerably
influenced by the Indian struggle for Independence.
Nearly a thousand Irish men who rebelled had no real
reason for that action except their deep love for their
motherland and passionate patriotism. They strongly felt
that British colonial rule was perpetrating grave
injustice by crushing their countrymen. Hearing of the
ugly happenings in Ireland, where the Britishers were
hunting down, torturing and executing freedom fighters,
the Irish soldiers inwardly simmered.

The British ensured that
the newspapers in India did not cover Irish incidents,
but news of the cruel and inhuman measures taken by
Britishers against the Irish occasionally filtered into
the barracks of the Connaught Rangers in Jalandhar
cantonment where they were stationed. During that
turbulent period of Irish history, many pitched battles
were being fought between the Irish Republic Army 
the Sinn Fein  and the British security force
 Black and Tans. The news of these battles reached
Irish soldiers, thousands of miles away in India where a
similar wind was blowing.

The fuse blew when one
of the Rangers got the shocking news that his brother in
Ireland was hanged by the Crown for giving shelter to
rebels. He went berserk and beat up an English officer.
This set off a chain reaction. The soldiers captured the
armoury, took English officers as hostages, declared
Jalandhar cantonment as the seat of the free Irish
Government-in-exile in hardly two days. Caught
unawares, the British Government in India was shaken to
the core.

The Irish soldiers in
India were not fighting for a piece of territory, but for
a fundamental principle. Therefore, when they felt
confident that they were the masters of Jalandhar
cantonment, they started negotiations for the freedom of
Ireland in lieu of returning the hostages, releasing the
armoury and returning the territory of the cantonment.
How could the British pay heed to such nonsense? To them
it was tantamount to an act of mutiny, but to the Irish
soldiers it was a "protest" against the
Crowns cruelty and breach of the repeated promise
of giving Ireland its freedom.

In the barracks, a lot
of argument and heated discussion went on to decide the
next course of action. One of the major groups was for
capturing more territory and strengthening their
positions so that the British could be taught a lesson
and the world would know of their plight and
Irelands struggle for freedom. Some level-headed
men, however, argued that as violence would be
self-defeating, the only way to tackle the British would
be through negotiations. The most vocal of this group was
one Jim Daley.

He pointed out to his
enraged comrades that as long as they did not take to
arms, it would not amount to a mutiny, but would be a
"sit-down protest" to express their concern for
the motherland. Eventually, they wrote a long petition to
the King and ceremoniously handed it over to British
officers. But no reply ever came. The King obviously
never received it!

The British authorities
and the top military brass, though caught unawares,
reacted fast. They quickly moved eight White regiments
from Amritsar, Ambala, Lahore and Simla cantonments and
surrounded the Jalandhar cantonment with a tight ring of
tanks, guns and infantry. Having cordoned the Irish, they
cut off the supplies of food and provisions and finally
switched off the water mains also. From a position of
strength, the British now asked for a peaceful surrender
by the mutineers. The Irish however, had
enough provisions and water from one or two wells inside
their territory to withstand the siege. Thus,
for a while, it was checkmate. In the meantime, all the
Indian regiments were moved away from Jalandhar. A tight
censorship was clamped with the excuse that some secret
war exercise was being conducted in the area. Thus,
neither the Indians nor the outside world knew of the
high-tension drama taking place in the heart of India.

Having taken all
security precautions and after tightening their grip, the
British sent a deputation to demand an unconditional
surrender. The team was flabbergasted by what they saw
when they reached near the regimental barracks. The
scenario that greeted them was one of total abandon and
gaiety. The Irish tricolour flew majestically not only on
the tall flag mast of the regimental quarter guard but
atop every single barrack. Most of the Irish soldiers
were singing patriotic ballads in the barracks while some
danced to Irish jigs instead of listening to the British
delegation.

This act of defiance and
rowdy behaviour angered the British but they felt that
attacking the Irish would be politically suicidal. What
would the world say to white men killing white men on
Indian soil where the situation was already explosive! It
would not only tarnish the British image all over the
world but also ignite innumerable political fuses. Thus,
having an upper hand, they preferred to wait.

It was almost two weeks
after the outbreak of this mutiny, which began in
mid-June 1920, that the Rangers had their first casualty.
A young soldier died of malaria. The heat of the Punjab
plains, dwindling food stores, shortage of drinking
water, lack of sanitation and on top of it the scourge of
malaria.... all of it started to weaken the iron will of
the dauntless Irish. The regiment broke up into various
groups, each with different ideas and desperate plans.
The British mounted their pressure for surrender, but the
Irish did not budge. They firmly and resolutely stood
together on the assumption that with courage they could
win.

The drama of
uncertainty, heightened tension, arguments, frayed
tempers, boozing and brawls went on. It was only the
logic and convincing arguments of Jim Daley and his group
which kept a lid on the boiling situation, but even they
could not keep everyone pacified. As soldiers by training
and temperament believe in instinctive action, some of
them blew up a part of the armoury hoping that it would
attract the attention of the world. The British were,
however, wily enough to cover it up as an unfortunate
accident during the war games. The whole matter was thus
hushed up and again no one knew the exact nature of the
happenings in Jalandhar.

After this incident,
Daley ran from barrack to barrack to calm the angry and
desperate soldiers before they could commit any further
suicidal acts. He and a few of his friends requested the
British to let them send a delegation to Delhi to present
their point of view, but no one paid heed to the request.
It was now the third week and the tricolour continued to
flutter proudly in that little Ireland inside India. It
was only after malaria and cholera gripped the barracks
that the situation became desperate. Daley and his
comrades made frantic efforts to jack up the dwindling
spirits.

At this stage, Daley
started concentrating on finding a way out of the impasse
as he did not wish to see his brave countrymen die like
flies and sick dogs. As an honourable surrender appeared
to be the right solution to him, he set out with a white
flag to meet the General-Officer-Commanding and offered
the proposal of surrender for the sake of his sick and
dying brethren. His main condition of surrender was that
all men would be honourably discharged and sent home as
citizens of Ireland. The cunning British agreed because
it was one way of bringing down the curtain on the
mutiny which had already lasted for three
gruelling weeks.

The rains were late that
year and the seltering heat in the month of July was
unbearable. Living in tents in such uncongenial climate
was like being literally in hell. Due to lack of
sanitation and without medical cover, Irish soldiers
started dying a dozen a day. Daley tried reasoning with
the British military authorities for a fair treatment and
early repatriation as agreed, but the high command
obviously had other plans. When they saw that the sick
and weak Rangers were demoralised and in a vulnerable
condition, they broke them into small groups on the
pretext of providing them accommodation in different
bungalow until a special train could be arranged to carry
them to a port. They were thus moved to various buildings
around the cantonment, overpowered, and then moved to
Simla.

This was to be the final
enactment in the tense drama of the Irish mutiny. The
military machine was set in motion to decide the fate of
the mutineers. In August, 1920, court martial proceeding
against 800 men began. The proceedings were conducted at
the army headquarters at Simla. Day after day, sentences
were passed. Hundreds were to be shot, many sentenced to
life imprisonment and the remaining awarded 10 to 20
years of hard labour in lock-ups.

Back home in Ireland,
the struggle for independence was gathering momentum. The
British knew that they would not be able to hold down the
valiant Irish for long. The Viceroy and the
Commander-in-Chief of India deliberated on the situation,
and took a political decision. This decision was
considerably influenced by the situation prevailing in
India which was not the least comfortable. All those who
were to be shot were pardoned. Sentences of imprisonment
were reviewed and remitted. The famous Connaught Rangers
were disbanded and their colours shipped back to the King
in England where they still hang at Windsor Castle.
However, there had to be a show of military discipline
and justice. Any defiance by a soldier amounted to an act
of mutiny and this had to be firmly established for the
dignity and honour of military tradition. To achieve
this, somebody had made a scapegoat  symbolic of
fair but firm treatment.

The one so chosen was
Jim Daley. He was led blindfolded to be shot by a firing
squad in one corner of Jalandhar cantonment in November,
1920. Under security cover, the body of Daley was buried
in an inconspicuous place, without a cross, and then
forgotten. He, who should have been awarded a Nobel Prize
for peace, was instead awarded bullets. The other
soldiers were packed off to England to serve their
respective sentences.

Later, in the fifties,
Jim Daleys mortal remains were dug out on the
request of the Irish Government and interned in a
churchyard of Simla. They were finally sent to Ireland a
decade later, to be buried with honour in the bossom of
his motherland.